If you’re viewing this page on a phone or tablet, please turn to view in landscape mode, thank you. If you can’t see the list of services on the right hand side please use the connecting links or scroll down for these and other events and information.

Updates during this time of pandemic and resources to use at home

• November sees All Saints Day and Remembrance Sunday Harvest  for details click here. In addition, there will also be services at the War memorials on Wednesday 11th – in Hessenford at 1050 and Downderry at 1045. Due to Covid restrictions attendance will be strictly limited and allocated on a first come, first served basis.
• Our churches are still open, our position is unchanged. For locations and details click here – we look forward to seeing you!
• Our online services will continue, led by Rev Lynn and the Ministry Team using Zoom software. These include morning and evening prayer and are on most days of the week. Click here for details. Please contact Rev Lynn if you would like to join us.
• Our churches are also open for private prayers and visitors, click here for details.
• Advent Course! We will be exploring the carol ‘O Little Town of Bethlehem’ over four weeks starting on Thursday 27th November at 7pm on Zoom, ending with Compline. Look out for details.
• Foodbank – appreciation for our efforts at Harvest.
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• Pub theology continues online……click here for details
• Lynn’s letter for November and the monthly newsletter can be found here. Lynn talks more about Remembrance arrangements and we learn more about our newly licenced reader Matt.
• Have a look at this book of modern prayers – worth a read Come+Pray+with+Me
• A booklet of prayers during the pandemic can be downloaded here: Outbreak Prayer Book Digital Single Pages 2 April_0
• All services will follow government guidelines as follows:
  • Social distancing – please sit 2m or more apart using marked pews or seats as they are positioned
  • Please use hand sanitiser provided on entering and leaving the church
  • Wearing of face covering is required
  • No singing – we may have some music to hum along to!
  • Communion will be with wafers only
  • Services will be on wipe clean laminated sheets – please leave on the seat at the end of the service

Online options

The Truro Diocese all age session at 9.30 on Facebook continue on a Sunday as usual! There is now a rota for these sessions that will still include Bishop Philip and Ruth.

Or you could still listen to one of the many radio options – Radio 4, Radio Cornwall offer services on a Sunday around 8am.

Or you could look at: Church of England website that now has more services to join – or at many churches and cathedrals up and down the country who have other offerings

A very good resource is https://www.churchofengland.org/more/media-centre/church-online

Browse a whole range of prayers you can choose from to read – or listen to:

Or using your computer, tablet or phone (as you prefer) and from your web browser access morning and evening prayer using this link:

Click here and choose what you need.

To read or hear the prayer for today, click on this link: http://cofe.io/TodaysPrayer

Browse around the various pages and you’re sure to find something that interests you.

Alternatively download an App for your tablet or phone. Church House Publishing or provide a number of these Apps and these can be downloaded from https://www.chpublishing.co.uk/apps/daily-prayer

Parish Contacts

Parish Priest: Rev. Canon Lynn Parker – main point of contact for all matters

Parish Wardens: Paul Gribble and Bill Woods

Readers/Licensed Lay Ministers: Richard Laugharne, Margaret Sylvester-Thorne, David Watters

For weddings, baptisms, funerals and church services:  Rev. Canon Lynn Parker, David Watters and Margaret Sylvester-Thorne

Children’s work: Rev. Canon Lynn Parker, Evelyn Reed, David Watters and Margaret Sylvester-Thorne

Messy Church: Evelyn Reed

For buildings and general parish enquiries: the Parish Wardens:   Paul Gribble and Bill Woods

For Safeguarding:  Margaret Sylvester-Thorne

Pastoral Visitors Team:  Pat Paxton

Parish Giving Scheme:  David Watters

Finances: the Treasurer, Paul Gribble

Electoral Roll: Brenda Daw

Enquiries about individual churches:

Downderry:  Andrew Pidgen

Hessenford: Fran Moore

St Germans: Richard Laugharne

Tideford: Sue Merrick

Deanery Synod Reps:  Margaret Sylvester-Thorne, David Watters and Bill Woods

PCC Members for April 2019

Sue Booth, Fiona Bristow, Yvonne Byles, Dawn Couling, Jenny Daniel, Sue Merrick, Fran Moore, Hugh Parker, Andrew Pidgen, Tim Pullin, Evelyn Reed, Rosemary Stevenson

Hire and other info on St Germans Priory Church for events:

The St Germans Priory Trust:   www.stgermanspriory.info

Hire of the Church Hall in Hessenford:  http://www.hessenford.net

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Lynn’s Letter

 Remembrance Services
Due to Covid restrictions we may not be able to do all that we usually do to mark this important date in our calendars. But mark it we must, whilst complying with the regulations of no parading, no singing and no gatherings of more than 6.
(This is how the regulations are as I write this 17/10/20 – so everything is subject to change)
Therefore, I propose holding a service of Remembrance at 10.45am on Sunday 8, where we can accommodate 30-40 people, safely distancing. Crosses and wreaths can be placed at the memorial before or after the service. The Legion will also lay wreaths at the memorial.
Also, there will be a Remembrance service at St Mary’s Sheviock on Sunday 8th at 10.45am; this service will be by ticket only.
The monthly communion service on Remembrance Sunday will be at St Germans – which will also include an act of remembrance, and afterwards people can walk across and lay their wreaths at the memorial cross.
On the 11th there will be a Remembrance service in St Nicolas Downderry at 10.45am, and after the service people can take their wreaths and crosses to the memorial without exceeding the “rule of 6”.
There will also be a small gathering at the memorial at Hessenford at 10.50am
There will be a lot of people who cannot attend, and for them it will be good just to stand in their homes, or at their front door, or in the garden, at 11.00am on the 11th; knowing that others in all parts of the country will be doing the same.
Whilst we are at war with Covid , we must not forget those who have given their lives in previous wars to give us the lives that we lead now.
WE WILL REMEMBER THEM

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For this month’s newsletter please click on this link 2020.11 Newsletter

Continuing our series of who’s who within the benefice – this month it is the turn of Matt, our newly licenced Reader. 

Hi – my name is Matt Frost and I am a (very) recently licensed reader for the Benefice of St Germans Group with Antony and Sheviock. My story started however when at the age of 17, having had no religious upbringing, I was invited to a meeting at a church in Nottingham where I heard the Christian Gospel proclaimed clearly for the first time. I was converted not long after. I don’t have space here to speak of all the times before then that showed God was working in my life without me even knowing.
I soon became involved with children’s and youth ministry before, in 1991, moving to Peterborough to oversee the youth and children’s work there on a part-time basis whilst working with a marine dive team for my day job. I then got an opportunity to go and live and work out in the USA for a short time where I was involved in Youth ministry whilst also studying at a bible college in Missouri. My life then took another unexpected turn that saw me returning to the UK and onto Plymouth to study for a degree in Marine Biology. I found university to be a very formative experience. I became President of the Christian Union and loved being exposed to a much wider range of theological opinions than I had been up to that point. I also met Louise at the Christian Union who I went on to marry after university!
My wife and I eventually moved to a church closer to where we lived in Cornwall where I was involved in worship leading and some preaching and teaching. In 2004 I also set up a south-west branch of Christians in Science and I have given many talks over the years in numerous churches on science-faith issues, apologetics and also more recently I have re-engaged with my life-long interest in the Middle East. In 2013/14 I felt challenged to be more involved in my immediate locality and began attending the monthly services in Tideford in 2015 before being confirmed into the Anglican Church on the 20th June 2016. I was invited shortly after that to apply to train as a reader as I was really keen to be more involved. I had been leading the worship for the monthly Parish Praise meetings but doing my preaching and teaching in other churches and venues.
This sounds in parts like a ‘me and God’ story but of course we are not called to walk this journey alone. My wife and I have walked this journey together including running a bible study group on Friday nights for many years. I have three amazing children and the biggest challenge continues to be juggling family life, a full-time job (Deputy Director of the Marine Biological Association) and church. My faith walk hasn’t all been plain sailing with some ups and downs along the way but God has always brought me through and I am enjoying being in a church where we support and encourage each other in our faith journey. I look forward to being part of what God is doing in SE Cornwall and beyond!

Matt at his licensing – read more at https://trurodiocese.org.uk/2020/10/celebration-as-five-readers-licensed/

~   News and Events in the Parish   ~

All our public events have been cancelled for the time being but we are meeting online where we can.

Zoom Pub Theology

Now running fortnightly

A chance to discuss ideas and thoughts about all matter of things theological.

After a short introduction of 5 minutes (or more), the conversation is open.

Meet via Zoom from 7.30 – 8.30pm every other Tuesday 

Topics:       TBA….please let Richard have any suggestions

For a Zoom link or enquiries or suggestions, ring Richard Laugharne (01503-230333) or email on richard.laugharne@nhs.net

All welcome! Click here to go back to top.

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Community responds through Church and School to help Downderry families

St Nicolas Church, Downderry

The folk at St Nicolas Church were delighted that so many members of our wider community joined the  initiative to help support needs arising from Covid-19 in our local school. In all we provided food boxes to the school to the value of £1,120. This was made so much easier by our good friends Kim and Richard at Downderry Stores who made up the boxes and added a contribution to each and every box – so yet one more big THANK YOU to them – and to all who contributed so generously.

We still hold a balance and we propose to support the school with around half of that to enable magical and educational books to be purchased to assist children whose educational needs fell behind while the school was closed. The remainder we will hold, earmarked for any second wave of Covid-19 and emerging needs identified by the school community.

The school deserves appreciation from us all for their dedication and commitment during the pandemic – in addition to meeting all the ever-changing requirements placed upon them, they have looked carefully at the needs of each individual child and put strategies in place to ‘close the gap’.

The willing support of so many people in the community was greatly appreciated by the Head of School – Jake Imrie – and his staff, as well as the St Nics community and the wider Parish of St Germans.  Once again our community has seen a need and responded to it.

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Messy Church

meeting in St Germans Methodist Church

Currently cancelled, but work going on in the background

Messy Church is a form of church for children and adults that involves creativity, celebration and hospitality – it’s fun!

If you’d like to help out please speak to Evelyn or ring her on 01503 230449

Find out more at https://www.messychurch.org.uk/what-messy-church-and-isnt

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Events at St Germans Priory Church

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None at present

Services and events in our other Benefice Churches

Please refer to details found here